Los Angeles daily herald., 1887-01-27
DURING THE WAR.
Keeping House in the
Southern COnfederacy.
SOME ORIGINAL MAKESHIFTS.
How the Ladies Kept their Tables
Supplied During the Dark
Days-Butter S25 a Pound.


In striking contrast tn the lavish
methods OF housekeeping practced in
Virginia barely three years before, were
our Confederate ways of providing for
the table. As the siege of Richmond
progressed, Iwell remember the anxious
faces worn by my mother and other
good housewives. A common saying
among them was, "You carry your
money to market in basket and fetch
home your provisions in a pocket.
| book!' With butter and lard at S25
a pound each, butchers meat "fore-
gone conclusion" bacon doing duty for
| the chief dish, its fat, obtained from
frying, made to serve as butter, veg
etables of the 'rarest, and, withal, set
of young people who kept provokingly
strong and hearty and were hungry
when they arose from their meals, no
wonder the poor mothers had their
hands full.
We had, during this time, nice
old copper-colored cook, Aunt Dilsey.
Her domain was, of course, a kitchen
independent of our dwelling, brick
path conducting to it from the rear yer.
auda. Directly after breakfast Aunt
Dilsey, with her clean blue check apron,
her head turbaned majestically in a
plaid bandana, appeared with her
wooden flour measure and sugar bucket
to receive allowances for the day. In
due time orders to Aunt Dilsey became
rather empty ceremony, but the good
old soul would have rather died than
| admit to herself deficiencies over which
we were laughing in family conclave.
Her breads were famous. Hot loaf
bread, beaten biscuits, corn dodgers,
butter cakes, no matter what she set
her hand to, expanded in her care 10
feathery lghtness, crisp and delicious
to the palate, having in them no sug.
| gestion of the tomorrow of indigestion.
Then who could cook sweet potatoes
like Aunt Dllsey? One method was to
parboil them, cut them in shapely seq.
ments. and bake with butter and sugar
till they emerged from the oven dainty
conf lection. nothing to suggest the taste
less boiled sweet potatoes SO often seen
today.
l mention this, especially. to tell OF
one day when supplies were at very
low ebb in our storeroom. We were
training to "a straw day" we said
lauehingly, when in came Aunt Dilsey,
iubilant, her irreproachable check apron
forming lumpy, knobby, odd.shaPed
bundle.
"What have you there, Aunt DiseJ?"
we cried in unison.
"Sweet. .taters, honey, thank the good
Lawd! | knowd'd He war'nt gWine for
! to desart u.s."
1t appeared that Dilsey's brother
Isham, a patriarch belonging to an estate
about forty miles from Richmond, had
made his way to town in one OF the
old fashioned hooded wagons, carrying
a load of supplies to his masters
brother. The sweet potatoes and a
dozen fresh eggs were a token OF frater.
nal Election to Dilsey.
''But, Aunt Dilsey, we couldn't think
of letting you cook them for our table,
and we can't afford to buy them at
sweet potato prices.
Ii Dilsey's blush could have been seen,
it would have dyed her countenance.
She looked the picture of humilated
dignity. 1t was hard to tell which
hurt her the more, our refusal to accept
her contribution, or our confession in
plain words that we couldn't afford to
buy, no matter what it was. There
was long discussion, and at the end of
it Aunt Dilsey hesitatipgly suggested
her willingness to accept in lieu
of the potatoes certain mantelet
or "visita" Of china silk, belonging once
to our mother and laid by for masquer-
aiding purposes and amateur theatricals.
The carmen. was the height of her am.
bition. saw her wearing it over large
hoopslirt the following Sunday after
noon when she went out at the back
gate to repair to meeting.
Aunt Dilsey took care that our table
was well supplied with breads and bis.
cult. But even these lost their charm,
when butter continued day by day to
absent itself from the little dish OF
beaten silver with COW for the handle,
that had come to us from English an.
cestors. The servants put 1t on the
table, all the same, and our damask was
white and shining, our Spode tea cups
as pretty as one could wish.
But what a hollow mockery that dainty
table service came to be, in time! l
have heard of a certain host of some
southwestern hotel, who, as the guests
filed into the dining-room, was wont to
stand at the head of the table and pro.
claim in stentorian voice, O rhyned bill
of fare:
"oh! the ham and the lamb
| The jelly and the JAM
and so on. | don't think his inventive
| faculties would have been taxed by the
recital of our Confederate menue-wheat
bread, corn bread, bacon fat, with sor-
rhum as dessert and condiment. If any
| one is at a loss to understand sorghum,
| may state that it a very bad kind of
molasses, about the manufacture of
which. in later Confederate days, there
was a considerable boom. AS this syrup
was sold in the Richmond market at
Sl2 gallon in 1866, the Virginia farm
ers realized in many cases S2,50O from
each acre of sorgum cane. These returns
may sound impressive, even when we
take into consideration the fact that
they were in Confederate currency. At
any rate wheat was set aside on many
farms for her more brilliant rival, sor-
ghum cane. In due time all OF our
sweetness came from the cloying syrup.
Cake was made with it, and on one rare
occasion they compounded taffy, which,
set to dry in basement window, tell
victim to the cat Aschemputtle. When
we discovered her ladyship she was sit.
ting in the dish licking path around
her. 1t was bitter disappointment. as
it was the first time in months such a
treat was allowed us. A little later a
friend from the country sent us gallon
of syrup made from watermelon juice.
requiring a good deal of the Marchioness'